ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — A survivor of the Halabja genocide has told Rudaw English of the horror of finding, then carrying his brother’s corpse for kilometers, 33 years after the chemical attack on the Kurdish city.
On the afternoon of March 16, 1988, warplanes were flying over Halabja, a city around 15 kilometers away from the Iranian border; the Iran-Iraq war eight years in and showing little sign of relent. Thirty-one-year-old Qadir Hassan and his family were preparing to leave Halabja and return to their hometown of Byara, which had recently fallen into the hands of the Peshmerga.
“We were around 20 people heading towards Byara in a Duxford military vehicle that had been abandoned near our house,” Qadir said. “My brother Rafaat and my cousin Ahmad said they would follow us riding mules because they didn't want to take up space in the car.”
Qadir and his family reached a village called Eneb, four kilometers northeast of Halabja, when Iraqi warplanes bombed the area, he said. By then, they had lost sight of Rafaat, a newlywed in his early twenties, and Ahmad, in his forties.
“As we reached Byara, I just couldn’t handle the idea of leaving my brother and cousin behind, so I had to head back to Eneb to find them,” Qadir said.
He wept as he recalled the moment he found the bodies of his brother and his cousin on the evening of March 16.
“I found the dead mules, then I found the bodies of my martyred brother and cousin close by.”
“I couldn't take both of their bodies, so I first grabbed my cousin’s body and left him in a schoolyard and covered his body with a blanket, so that we’d be able to find him among the hundreds of bodies that had fallen on the streets,” he said.
Qadir then went back and put his brother’s dead body on his shoulder, carrying him through the dark by foot.
“It was dark, and my eyes were damaged from the chemical gas,” he said. “I couldn't tell if it was my brother’s body I was carrying on my shoulder, but it felt like it was him.”
When it was late at night, Qadir reached Kharpane, a village around nine kilometers east of Halabja.
“I collapsed in Kharpane with my brother’s body right next to me,” he said. “The next day, people found us thinking I was dead too, and they took us to Byara where I buried my brother.”
“The following day, I returned to Eneb in the hopes of finding my cousin’s body, but Iranian guards didn't let us back in.”
Two days after he was prevented from entering the area, Qadir was finally able to return to Eneb and search for his cousin’s body, but it had already been found by other relatives. Ahmad is now buried at the Monument of Halabja Martyrs.
Around 5,000 people, the majority women and children, were killed when Saddam Hussein’s regime dropped mustard gas onto the city of Halabja on March 16, 1988. Local survivors of the genocide recall the smell of the gas as smelling like apple, making it more pleasing for people to inhale.
Recognized as an act of genocide by Iraq's Supreme Court in 2010, the attack has left a permanent mental scar not just on survivors of the attack, but the Kurdish people as a whole.
Many survivors suffered long-term health problems as a result of the attack, which was part of a longer genocidal campaign against Kurds in Iraq by the Baathist regime. Qadir still suffers from long-term health problems, such as breathing difficulties, heart disease, and damaged eyesight.
"There are still 486 people who are seriously ill from the chemical attack in Halabja," Loqman Abdulqadir, president of an association for victims of the attack told AFP.
Qadir now resides in Byara, where he claims to know at least 15 surviving families of the Halabja genocide – all of whom have lost close family members and friends.
The survivors’ search for lost family members, especially those who went missing as children, continues 33 years later. Ayad Arass, who heads the local child protection commission, told AFP that “142 children are still missing”.
Related: Halabja genocide: ‘Our wounds are reopened’
Saddam, overthrown in 2003 after a US-led invasion, was hanged in 2006, after being found guilty for ordering the Dujail massacre, in which 148 Shiite Muslims were killed.
Though Saddam’s execution was met with celebrations in the streets across Iraq, his death put an end to proceedings against him for the deaths of 180,000 Kurds, including those killed in Halabja, during the Anfal campaign of the late 1980s.
